01/15/2014

His eyes lifted into the milky glow of the frosted window as he pulled on the broken strap hanging from his backpack.

It has nowhere to go.

The stoplight sank and weaved against the gentle wind, its red eye winking between bends. And the car filled with the kind of quiet that happens only after a morning rush.

It just follows the wind.

His small voice left cracks in the glass.

Sometimes it moves straight down, and sometimes it stays awhile, just floating, wandering a bit.

The green light pulled us forward.

There is this quiet space without words, just wind. Where there is no hanging on, just flight. Without outcome, just grace.

Do you remember the bird?

The one caught in the garage between the beach chairs and the cans of paint? Its small chest pulling for breath, the deep reach of want, the carnal thunder of a race still running.

And I thought about the pull, the tug to be right, to be made well, to be made known.

And I thought about the wings that flap so hard, trying. Trying.

Trying to make the wind.

The snowflakes kept falling, straight, then bent, coming to the ground shaken and soft. And the gentle landing, blessed by the wind, by the snowflakes already arrived, blanketing the hard ground below.

11/21/2013

He had a sore throat. So I pulled his blanket up around his neck, letting his small eyes peer over the edge of cotton and down feather escape.

“It hurts.”

“I know.”

I found the top of his head where my kiss wouldn’t get lost, somewhere between his ruffled eyebrow and the skyscrapers of tousled hair. And I let my mother hands pull his blanket around each leg, smoothing the parts of him still wrinkled.

And I followed him with my eyes, until all that remained was the top of his head rising from the back of the couch like a noon day sunset of brunette.

And somewhere a voice.

“Is my throat broken?”

Rest.

Cave into the muffled insulation of closed eyes. This view from under the blanket, where eyes are made softer by the screen of bright light and the silence of outside voices.

Sometimes we have to let our voice rest.

Let the cavernous hold of time wrap fingers around our words. Let our heart listen again to the deep voice of spirit and wind.

And there’s this shift here, an opening and grafting into some kind of deep reservoir of hope, the hollowed out place that waits to be filled.

“Why does it hurt so much?”

Maybe your voice just needs to heal.

Because somewhere deep inside there is a beautiful song playing,leaving you breathless in its wake.

Or maybe it just hurts.

And we have to let go, the clutch and swell of some age old idea that got knit between the beautiful weave of your heart, like some kind of random string pulled, left to dangle over an open hole.

We’re given these open wound moments, these glass on the floor moments.

And it feels like a lost breath caught in the net of sorrow. Released.

A hand reaching from beneath the tidal swirl. And this. Our first breath above water.

And there, inside the net held close, somewhere between eye and heart, found.

This broken winged bird set free.

There is something beautiful caught inside the wind.

Something being made new again.

And it feels like an open mouth horizon breathing a sunrise over these newly calmed seas.

And the day feels fiery and light. Burnt edges still smoldering.

And this reckoning, this place where each wound, each whisper, each small heart is tooled and carved. Remembered.

This is the place where the heart is made new. Again.

And again.

And again.

“Is it broken?”

You are not broken.

You have loved well.You have spoken grace when the wind’s voice pushed your sail.

You are not broken.

Only worn by the sea mists salty tongue.

And all of the ways we make ourselves small, the wrongs pooled inside the deep crevice holes. Broke open and released. These small waves grown inside the wind’s tuck and white capped kiss.

You are not broken.

You are made new.

He walked into the studio, blanket still wrapped, collecting bits of paper along its tired edge.

“You’ve made something new.”

He held my hand and we named the day, an offering for the patchwork of wide stitches holding us together.

12/10/2012

There is still no snow. Just the quiet gray and black lined limbs of trees waiting to hold the white dust like vintage Christmas cards. I'll need to be patient. Shake my snow globe and visit the glittered, white fabric holding our little village of houses and snowmen. Tip toe past the beaded glass garland and pinecone band of elves playing their flutes and trombones on my kitchen counter.

We lifted the tree from the top of the car this morning after the boys scattered through the door and waved their goodbyes. There is always a moment, the moment when the tree is released, the twine once holding all of its soft white pine, cut, branches falling into place, waiting for the hands to decorate it. And it is in this moment, when true shape is revealed, when the gift opened, the bow torn, this faint line of love outlining the very meaning of these days.

The boys will come home and rummage through boxes of handmade ornaments and I will teeter over the box marked FRAGILE, gently craning to place each glass globe out of harms way.

There are these words, To and From, gracing the cardboard and paper creations. The sweet scribe of his four year old hands, the jagged outline of fingers and thumbs turned magically into trees.

And I think of his heart and the way it poured out onto the page. The way he reached and wished for this way to reveal this tender place inside of him. And the excitement bubbling and churning inside his stomach as he thought of the secret gift he would place into my open hands when he got into the car.

And his eyes watched as I opened his gift, the tapping foot, the leap and kick of his toes, his arms swirling in the air, "Open it! Open it!"

And the anticipation of this love opened like a closed flower blooming under the soft backdrop of white snow falling, melting on the car's warm windshield.

"I love it so much. It's beautiful."

And the shoulder up to the ear and his arms reaching to pull me in.

"Beautiful."

We made our own gifts this week in the studio. A papercut version of this love, a gift to hold behind our backs until the moment is just right, when our hearts can take it no more and this creation must be given and our heart and eyes seen.

"Beautiful."

So we brought all of the festive we could find, the cheer and merry, the happy and holy, and carried it all into the studio. The moments we made and gave, held and shared, and poured them all into one handmade poinsettia vase for a very special To and From.

And there was the imagining, the wondering, the waiting. The anticipation building for the glue and the cut that would come together to create a moment. To. From.

And the certainty given to this moment, extending into the heart of another, the hands unwrapping, the toe tapping, the hands wringing, the heart waiting. And the string cut, revealing the true shape of love, held tight in these eyes and hearts.

Use your medium colored red paper to cut 5 large petals. Use your light colored red paper to cut 5 small petals. The light petals will be the interior flower inside the larger flower.

Use your dark red paper to cut long stems for each flower petal. The dark stems will go on both the medium and light petals. Use your glue (either gluestick or matte medium) to secure the stems in place.

You will end up with 5 large petals and 5 small petals, all ten with dark red stems.

Now, cut our two to three leaves for the flower. Start by cutting out the large petals with the medium colored paper. Then use the darker colored paper to create an interior petal that will be glued inside to create shading.

Once you are finished with the leaves and petals, you can begin assembling the flower. Start with a sturdy piece of white paper. I use a nice tag paper. Start with your leaves. Placing a small amount of glue on your paper, begin creating a star, moving around in a circle. Follow the shape of your stems to create the star.

It is important to note: Do not glue the entire petal down onto the paper. It will create difficulty when you go to cut it off of the paper. Just glue under the center if possible.

Once your flower is dry, you can cut it out. Be sure to cut from behind the flower, so the paper it is adhered to is left unseen.

Take your wire and cut a size appropriate for the vase you are using. It will act as your stem. Give yourself a bit extra to create the coiled area the flower will be glued onto. Using your needle nose plier, wrap the wire around the nose of the plier until it looks like a small coil or nest. At this point I use the palm of my hand or the top of the pliers to flatten the coil.

Use hot glue to attach the coil to the bottom of the flower. I sometimes place an additional piece of paper over the glue when it is hot to give extra reinforcement. At this point you can place your poinsettia inside the vase!

Use ribbon of your choice and make a special handmade tag of your design with words of love and merry wishes.

11/19/2012

The light moved fast, painting shadows over the faded green field. There was the last cold kiss of a
regular Tuesday and my hands cupped his fingers as his feet swept the frosted
field. There was the crack of branch and swing of arms and the quick break of
fingers falling apart from the nest of palm and thumb. And there was the race
to the pond, the sound of nylon scratching with each stride and his small chirp
of discovery.

The air was still and we made small waves with our hum and breath. The abandoned cities of cattails and tall bent grasses opened doors and windows to mark our return. And the quiet light sent secret messages only our hearts could hear.

And there was a yawn in the bend of his hand, a hollowed out center that yearned to be thread with the quiet presence of love and her melodic song.

And it was his small fingers inside my hand, the pulse under his nails, the criss cross veins running alongside my worn wrinkles that told me to listen.

The red winged blackbirds were gone. The ones that dove under deep blue skies and sang in urgency as we moved around the nests once filled with egg and chick.

And her voice, the one hidden behind thunder, the warning that rumbles behind the protective mama heart, telling the rain just where to land. She was there, in the shadow of fall, under winter's restless light. She whispered. This is home.

She said she needed words. Something that could line the inside of her coat on winter days, when the light felt broken and dim. And there was some kind of respite in her wings, a hiding place from all of the feeling and hurting. And her feathers were lined with dust, the kind that came from uncovering secrets.

Sometimes the light can bend in a certain direction, turning all of the leaves into wings, the branches into bare, naked limbs reaching for the nearest cloud. And there, when the light is just right, I can see the outline of her nest, still warm with memory.

These fingers entwined, these moments engrained, are the intricate weaving of her smile, her eyes bright with hello, a dangling paintbrush between two loose fingers. It is the faint breath between twig and leaf, the protection and warmth seated in the depth of her hold.

He held the nest close and lifted a leaf from its center.

"It's made from all that remains, the stuff left behind. A shoelace or wrapper from some old gum. A broken piece of grass or ribbon left in the rain. Bits of paper and mud. It's all here. Inside this little nest. Nothing is forgotten."

And her love feels like the wind blowing even when the windows are closed.

And there are the times I feel most alone in the forest, when I can no longer identify specie or skin, when the smell of grass is dull and the bark no longer a pattern to follow. When my eyes are closed and the caves covered with doors of boulder and stone.

"Will you hold my hand?"

And her words of love, the ones she wrote on the insides of her fingers, so when our hands met, I could feel her story told between my thumb and the curve of her nail. These words are my ladder to this place you call home.

"Will you hold my hand?"

"I already am."

And I can hear her quiet song on the flutter of a bird's wing, carrying away the worry, the fear, the small voices caught in nets. And the place she wrote her story still remains on these hands, each vein a path past grown wrinkles and tree lined fingertips, each holding a nest from their wiry bends.

And her heart, the one that shines each time a leaf lifts in a breeze. Her heart, entwined in the deepest part of this nest, rests with each rise and fall of breath.

So I move things around, make a space for the cutting and grafting, the weaving and stitching, the building of nest and home. So these moments, woven in love, the curl of her hair, the way her eyes filled with tears just before she laughed, the way her voice paused before exclamation, the way the light would soak up her motherhood just so it could shine. I will place you here. Forever.

And I remember the hands that cradled this wreck of a girl with one, curled lash wink, the way love can sometimes feel like a leap, a dance over hot stone ash.

And the fragile walk through dark forests, searching, while your hands lift me over thorn and brush. And there you are, making friends with the moon, smiling over a bent sunset, pushing its warm blanket over our skin. And your song, the fingers tucking in each loose corner.

And to find love perched, held between breaths, enough time for my eyes to fill with tears. Sometimes all I can see are the lashes under her eyes, all of the wishes set loose on the wind, and the sunset when the waves were so loud we had to yell over their roars.

I will place you here. Between the dew of this one morning and the crest of this fallen night. Your love thread between wrapper and twig, damp clay and fallen hair. Between the bend of my finger and the joint of his hand. In the motherhood I forgot to own and the friendship I carry in the smallest pocket of my heart, this nest,

made from all that remains.

*And a film made during the creation of this shadowbox, filmed by the lovely, Lara Vagenius. Thank you, beautiful girl.

11/06/2012

Winter is near. I can hear him clearing his throat behind the gray stacked clouds and the fallen oak leaf making its farewell trip to the ground. There was ice on the road. The glassy tickle of a first frost. The quiet shake and hold, the white handed knuckles wrapped gently around each stem. And my heart jumped. There was a trickle of excitement, for the impending quiet and soft fallen snows. My feet woke the ground with each step. And I tried not to wake them from their deep slumber.

The light wished and fell and moved in the breeze. My coat caught the edge of the stem and a pane of broken glass frost fell to the ground. So I sat in the audience and watched as the sun found each crystalized heart and warmed it with its smile.

And sometimes it is best to wait, to let the heart thirst. To feel the build and the swell. And this time, this leading up to, it asks for the quiet nurture of candles lit in darkened windows, the gentle fire left to burn only in the glow of its last embers.

And for the cold heart, the heart waiting for the hand of warmth, it is this curve of love that retreats the frosted morning. There is a season between seasons, the wait. The flex and hold. The arched back, the holding close. The waiting for the sun to reach the heart, for fingers to find deep pockets, for the cheek to feel the red frost itch against the stoked fire.

It seems almost impossible to think of this coming holiday season, to move past days not yet lived. But we did. We journeyed ahead to lay a path for love to follow this December. When hands are held tighter, with cheeks fully flushed with warmth and wonder, when these eyes will fill with the reflected twinkly light on dark paths. And home is home again.

Curtains opened, soups spilled into handheld cups and the stream of smoke from chimneys warmth spreading laughter and memory over the naked forest.

"How will we know when it's time?"

When the season is ripe with lit trees and cinnamon ornaments and the wayward holly berry is found under open cabinet doors.

And the smallest hand found freedom in the rise.

"What if we loved every day?""What if we all shared something that was ours?"

A smile. A hope. A dream. A card. A poem.

Our hearts.

And the path grew longer.....

Our 25 days of Love. Our very own Advent Calendars.

And they began. With day one.

How will I give? How will I share? How will I love from right here?

25 cards for 25 days for 25 hearts.

So they drew. They outlined and filled and placed the decorated expressions of warmth on each and every card. They stopped to laugh, to shake their tired hands, to reach for the artist's choice sustenance.....cheese nips and pretzels.

And their hearts became softer and their words moved between them.

"What if I gave her a new toy?""What if I made him a a Lego?"

"What if I gave my mom a great big kiss?"

And the voice of every heart that ever opened its doors to the world, the voice that shakes in the wintery air of vulnerability. This voice, found its way between shapes and textures, watercolors spilling and laughter holding.

"But what if they don't like it?"

"What if they laugh?"

"What if it isn't good enough?"

And she needed to know. Right then. Right now. How will these words be protected? How will my heart know when to open its doors?

How will I know when it's time?

When the frost is thick and the sun is still hidden, when the dark clouds blanket the sunrise in its weight, when your wee path is covered in snow. A light will come. The rise suspended between morning light and nightfall's shadow. And one small stream of smoke from a chimney hidden deep within the forest will find your heart and pull you back home to this place of safety. Where love is real. Where love is strong. Where love melts this morning frost.

And your voice will feel free to run past the broken frost falling and these hands will give and shape and hold. The moment the paint meets the page and the holy words are written....

To:

From:

Because this love you hold is bigger than all of the doors still closed.

Your words are the warmth on the coldest morning. Your hands bring color to the deepest shade of gray. This love is the first ray of light on a frosted morning drive.

And your love, your love is the sweet lit candles on a cold winter night guiding a lost heart home, melting the last bit of frost on one hopeful, curled petal.

09/13/2012

I moved the computer to the laundry room. Along with all of
it’s tangled cords and lonely plugs-in’s waiting to meet their perfect fit
connections. And it feels like I have placed an entire city into the sea. The
skyscrapers of electric lights, neon advertisements, pulls on wants and where’s
and it’s wreckage of static now silenced by the rhythmic hum of the tranquil
waves of fall.

I can feel the quiet settling in, the open window studio
days. I’m battening down the hatches and melting into the studio light. I’ve been holding things closer to my heart. The
buzz of summer now dulling with color wheel shades of orange and sandy bottom beach bags hung to rest. I haven’t cut paper in almost three months.
And my hands feel atrophied. I try to stay very intentional in the summer
months about not working while the boys are home. I gather and sketch, collect verse and
composition and wait for the opening to come when this collection of notes can
be cut into symphonies.

It’s been a year, a year since I’ve put those words and cut
pieces of paper into the world. A year without the protection of my island
shyness, my insular armor and rusty shields.
It’s been a year since Heart Box Studio opened the doors of my heart. And there are boats on my shores, sails opened
wide, anchors lifted, adrift in the current and wind of trust.

So I cut again. I open the book and spread my fingers over
the words and tear the page from the binding and cut. I start again and feel
the beginning give it’s approving tip of the hat. And the words may fail and the paper may
wrinkle and the adhesive may not hold. And a year ago, I hesitated at risk. I
leaned into my heels and waited for assurances. I waited for the hand of absolutes
and for sure’s to give me permission. A year ago I cowered at foolishness
revealed. But one year, 365 days later, I am leaping and hurdling off cliffs I
once kneeled below. I have been saying yes to the things that pile rocks inside
the pit of my stomach. I no longer worship at the altar of outcome. Today I
worship the holy, the divine intersection where creativity meets my hands, the
sweet kiss of mornings lost in paint and paper and strobe light flickering
sunshine through wind bent trees. And I wait for the Spirit to fill this empty
cavern once again.

We went back to the dunes, the place where we made this
movie last year, the little piece of film that inaugurated my first post. And the boys were one year smaller and the
button was still broken on his pants and he still loved to wear his Frank
Sinatra shirt.

"I lay down my fever dreams for you.I believe them all, even if they never came true."

We watched the birds become black silhouette cut outs
against the afternoon sun. We watched as they hung on watercolor clouds, the
miniature mobiles spinning in circles of migration. And the gray moon seagull
with it’s wings dipped in charcoal opened his wing, revealing all that was
hidden underneath, the tender space between heart and wing.

These wings, these fallen sails, drifting over open seas,
wait for the spirit of trust to lift them into the clouds. And there was a
call, a sweet reminder that the boat has made it to shore, reminding us the
sail and the wing are the same.

And these wings have the distinct scent of sea and sand,
travel and hand holding, the way a small child can smell of hard wind, seen
only through the witness of tangles and knots in his hair.

“It's not as windy as before.”

Sometimes the wings take us places, places that live far
outside the tiny island heart, well past memory and pain, over the moon and
through the night.

Sometimes the wind picks up speed and it feels like the sky
is too big, too wide to secure the ropes, the strings of the sail. And the
trust is the eyes closed, dip and plunge past cloud and harbor. It is the bent
wing giving in to the whispers of both breeze and squall. It is the hard blown
gust that has me holding onto tree trunks and telephone poles, chasing after
loose paper bewilderment.

And there is the kind of tornado wind, the wind that tears
at your very walls, tearing your home apart, leaving parts of you in fields,
hanging from tree limbs, thrown past median strips and county lines. The kind
of wind that changes things forever, that comes without warning, in the middle
of the night, ringing like the weight of steel on thin tracks. The kind of wind
that leaves you collecting these parts of yourself for years, finding a lost
smile under wood planks and deep gut, laughter in shallow, muddy creeks.

There are these people in my life, people who have whispered
over me beautiful harmonies, sonnets of wisdom and encouragement. Voices that
have plucked away all of the broken and torn feathers of my once upon a time
wings.

I told myself I wouldn’t do it if it was just to keep things
shiny, to hold up all of the right words, to paint a picture of false
happiness, to maintain the facade of wings opened wide. I told myself I
wouldn’t do it if I couldn’t be brave, if I couldn’t bring my guts to the page,
if I couldn’t watch fingers grow around nerves and worry.

Because the art is made to remove the layers, to allow God into
a space of opening, where love sits in holy silence rearranging this forest
inside my heart, making paths where there are thorns, holding the raw and
igniting the beat.

Your words, your encouragement and strong arms, each a
feather in the wings I carefully stretch wide over these dark forests.

And these are the new wings beginning again, a new shadowbox, that will connect together with many more to become a new story, a new girl with a new heart.

So, I will slip back into the quiet, find a seat in the
unknown, faithfully close my eyes and let my heart be led. I will pin these new wings onto an open heart and take another leap into
love’s open hands.

What is it for you? The thing that opens your sails, that
lifts your wings over fear and wonder? What is the thing that calls your name in
the early morning hours and taps on your shoulder from the bend of your knees?
What is the thing you are sure you can’t do, the thing that has been written
and folded into four corner square love letters and sealed for another life,
another day, when the winds are calm and the sea has settled, when safety is
just a dip of your toe into the full aquatic beauty of the underwater
unknown. What is it that stirs your
heart into wide open skies, that leaves feathers on the shores for you to
discover?

Fly. Leap. Run off cliffs and feel the hands of grace catch you in the wide net of mistakes that don’t matter and fears that
can’t fly. Because this creation is worth it. These new beginnings have God’s
hands all over them, rooted deeply in the excavation of fear and the gentle
cultivation of love.

And a giveaway for these one year old wings, because this
art only has life if it is held in someone’s hands or reflected in someone’s
eyes. This art only has life because of you, because of the space you give for
splintered moments of fear, for the balanced hands that hold the sail, the
feathers you have placed in wings that hover between the flight and the
landing.

"Spread Your Beautiful Wings and Fly" is a 16" x 20" signed and framed giclee print of the original drawing. Simply leave your name in the comments and I will add you to the list. Let's meet back here on Tuesday, September 25th, and I will let you know who won:)

And when you finally spread your wings, when the wind has
gathered and the sails have been lifted, be ready. Because you just never know
where this wind may take you.